Lowri blows out a breath. ‘We are taking great risks every hour that we stay here! You took a risk when you walked between worlds. Is it not my turn? My choice to make?’ She crosses her arms, every moment of being controlled, of being toldnoat Coven Septern rearing up in her mind, her own personal monster of bitterness and frustration, and it wears her mother’s, her Malefant’s, face.
‘The witch has a point there.’
‘This does not concern you, Hellius,’ Lowri snaps.
She steps towards Eli and he runs a hand down his face. ‘I carried you here when you were dying.’
‘And you can carry me back out if you must. We willtake Gracious with us. Isaiah’s research too.’ Then she adds gently, ‘I am not asking your permission, cousin. Allow me to make my own choices.’
Eli sighs deeply, eyeing her. Then he nods. ‘So be it.’
Lowri turns to Hellius, holding out her wrist. ‘How much blood, then? Tell me and I can decide.’
‘Not your blood,’ Hellius says, licking his lips. ‘Your magic. You must speak the witch words for giving, for offering. That’s what Isaiah surmises in his notebook. You must use your witch words and offer up your light magic.’ He moves to the corner, throwing a covering off a large contraption. Made of glass and silver, it gleams in the dull light, a balloon-like glass bottle with an open funnel at the top, covered in a latticework of silver. At the bottom is a stopper, like a tiny tap, and inside there is nothing.
Eli walks to it, examining it carefully. ‘The silver encases the magic. The glass itself is tempered. I saw a sketch in one of his notebooks, but there was no explanation. I just flicked past …’
‘It distils the magic within, changing it from fog, if it’s shadow, to liquid,’ Ethlet says in awe. ‘He theorised that the light magic would act differently, that it may sink, that it may be more concentrated and therefore heavier than shadow, which floats as the fog does, overhead.’ She shakes her head slowly. ‘Isaiah spoke of this process, but I thought it was only theoretical. To see the apparatus he dreamed up …’
‘The sketches that you stole, I presume?’ Eli says sharply to Hellius.
‘And aren’t you glad of that now?’ Hellius says. ‘If not for me, his work would be deep in the Society archives. They wouldn’t have even thought to give you his theories, his dreams … They never believed in him.’
‘But you did, and instead of working on it with him, supporting him in his request for funds from the Society, you stole the design and created it for your own gains. He didn’t know about this, did he?’ Eli presses, gaze like a blade, pinned to Hellius.
‘He didn’t,’ Hellius says, deflating for the first time. ‘I’m sorry.’
Eli looks away, crossing his arms. Silence descends for a moment before Lowri makes a decision. Not for Hellius, not for his selfish gains, but for her, for Eli. For his father’s world and theirs.
‘So I offer up my magic, into this funnel at the top …’ Lowri says.
‘Then the device distils it. The shadow will remain in a cloud in the top of the balloon, just like the fog. The light will sink, pooling, so that it can be drained in liquid form.’
‘In theory,’ Eli says.
Hellius shrugs. ‘As Ethlet said, that was your father’s theory.’
‘Well,’ Lowri says, clearing her throat. ‘Give me some space, all of you. Hellius, a tumbler to draw the light magic. Ethlet, watch the door. And Eli …’
‘Yes?’
‘Do not interfere. No being the hero. Not today.’
Eli chuckles darkly. ‘You know me too well, Lor.’
Lowri smiles, then gestures to the funnel at the top, feeling her magic, still slightly wrong, almost syrupy as it clots in her fingertips, too little still, as though poured from a bottle, rather than a well. She calls upon a witch word, the one for the act of giving. The one for selfless love. And she allows it to pour from her lips, sweet as honey, gentle as spring rain.
Amoria.
brielle spins on the spot,a witch word on her lips. But it’s hopeless. With Shayle, Hira and another hunter, Grieshal, all crowding round her in the tight confines of the alley, she has no chance of escaping them.
‘Release Pearl and Helene, and I’ll come with you. Neither of them are witches,’ Brielle says, squaring up to Shayle. If Pearl and Helene could get away, if she doesn’t have to worry about them, she can try to escape.
‘No, I don’t think so. The little ghost is coming with us, as well as your friend from the Far Isles.’ Hira jerks her chin at Pearl. ‘She’s got a reputation. More lethal than most of Coven Septern’s hunters, that one. Nice try.’
Pearl bares her teeth and Hira takes a half step back, alarm flitting across her features. Brielle chuckles. ‘Scared of a ghost now?’
‘Enough,’ Shayle says, looping a spelled braided rope round Pearl’s wrist, tying it to her own. ‘We’ll draw attention.’
